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1891Bro

1891Bro

I look at things different than the normal joe being in construction I always line things up......if things look off well it bothers me......it sucks trust me I am always looking at things with the glass half empty attitude...….

I’m in the same field and I just switch it off when they ain’t paying me. I do understand though.

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metrokat

metrokat

Thanks everyone. The journey has been eventful thus far. My fresh ocean rocks arrived yesterday - that was eventful too. More about that later.

Before I moved in, I set up a temporary 40B in the kitchen.

That brick in there is a Brightwell Xport BIO Plate. It has been in my system 2 years at this point so it has about 11000 feet of surface area inside where my bacteria lives. Essentially I moved my biological filtration when I moved this brick. I had been running a canister filter on the old system for well over 6 weeks and I moved that over as well.

@Mariaface has let me borrow her NanoBox Duo and that along with a Maxspect Ethereal jury rigged on the most ghettofabulous light stand is what is lighting the temporary holding tank at the moment.

I now have netting and one glass pane covering the 40B but the glass panes are from my living room end tables 😄

Also - Calleigh managed to jump in the tank the first night so I'm lucky that she didn't break the glass. She's curious even now but I think she learnt her lesson not to walk on top of the tank. Maybe. Hopefully.

This is Bumble. He was the size of a paper pin when Live Aquaria shipped him to me. At the time of the move I had 2 gobies, Maria and I could not find even a single one when we caught the other fish and emptied the tank. But when we were scooping out all the dirty nasty sand and detritus to fully empty the tank I saw this little guy sitting in cold nasty water for I don't know how long - at least 12 hours.

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lkoechle

lkoechle

We have been keeping Sansa locked in our room with us at night for the last week until her curiosity over the new tank subsides. We are concerned our lights look like convenient landing pads. lol She behaved herself last night which was her first night of freedom since we got the new tank. These feline youngins are just one thought away from mischief though 🤣

How has your foxface done with corals? @skoechle doesnt like them, but I do... Thats frequently how our fish/coral/anything goes. lol

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metrokat

metrokat

We have been keeping Sansa locked in our room with us at night for the last week until her curiosity over the new tank subsides. We are concerned our lights look like convenient landing pads. lol She behaved herself last night which was her first night of freedom since we got the new tank. These feline youngins are just one thought away from mischief though 🤣

How has your foxface done with corals? @skoechle doesnt like them, but I do... Thats frequently how our fish/coral/anything goes. lol

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metrokat

metrokat

The nitrogen cycle has been going on too long already IMO. I've never cycled a tank with dry rock so this is both a first and a frustrating first. 3-4 days of ammonia at 2ppm wasn't doing it for me so I threw in the aforementioned Brightwell Xport brick and boom, within 24 hours there was a serious dent in the ammonia. It took another 24 hours for it to go lower, then I added Dr Tim's ammonium chloride to get it up again. It is still taking more than 24 hours to get it back down to nothing so the cycle continues. I am reevaluating my understanding of the cycle through this whole timeline.

I'm quite blessed to have friends that give so much of themselves and their time. I already mentioned all that Miss Maria did and continues to do. Then there is Michael, who drove again all the way from Long Island and it took him a little over 3 hours to reach me this time due to an accident. Took him about the same time going back due to another accident. I feel sure that he's going to need a teleporter from now on.

So Saturday we finally got the light installed!!! The ceiling is pure concrete which we weren't anticipating or prepared for the last time Michael came over to install it 2 weeks ago. He got carbide drill bits, concrete anchors and it took a lot of work to get it drilled. It's just perfect.

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metrokat

metrokat

Great progress this weekend, what great friends! I've had to battle with a concrete ceiling before, that's no fun 😤

I love the rock cove you designed too, lots of great shelves. Curious to see what the rock heap turns into!

Thanks. Yeah, I have branches to work with so some form of a Dong-scape is probably going to happen.

20 hours ago, HarryPotter said:

Interesting, all the dry rock. I thought you were a dry rock ‘hater!

Not a hater - just not a lover. And the feeling continues.

6 hours ago, DaveFason said:

Looking great! Curious why did you go with dry rock?

-Dave

The shapes of the rocks I managed to get blew me away. The right side cove for example - the bottom rock is a single curved rock from caribsea (Life rock). It is very heavy and I don't really care for the density of it but the shape is gorgeous. The Marco rocks are new shelves that he just introduced so they make this layering look possible. The very bottom has Stax from 2 little fishies which are flat pieces and perfect for raising up the scape an inch or 2. If I had to evaluate all the different rocks I managed to use the Caribsea shaper were pretty outstanding. Just wish they came in less dense material.

4 hours ago, dferrari13 said:

I would say dry rock or life rock is the way to go... it gives the tank a little bit of a slow start but it pays off in the end because you are avoiding all sorts of pests and problems. Nice scape!

If my ocean rocks came in the shapes that Life rock from Caribsea came in, I would go with the ocean rocks every time. The possibility of pests are there but the natural bacterial slime that comes with those rocks keeps the system healthy.